Less
by Amongthegreats
Summary: For Soul, less is more.


**A/N: I haven't written in a while, so I decided to change that. It feels like almost everything I write turns to crap nowadays (I'm exhausted after writing five AP English essays, and I am still not done with the final drafts, UGH), but I hope you still enjoy this. I like writing Soul centric stuff. I dunno why. (And a tiny winny bit of SoMa smut, yay?) Enjoy!**

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Sometimes, less is more.

Soul grew up in a lavish household, filled with the finest things. The young boy didn't have it rough growing up finically in the slightest. Five star meals were served on the best dinnerware imaginable, stiff coats were worn dry cleaned and all, and tightly packed high end cocktail parties were many evening's highlights.

The motto there: bigger is better.

That including becoming bigger, better, and more successful in music. Soul didn't mind the piano to be honest. It gave him a reason to escape from his cooing mother's maids as they tried to fix his hair, or tried to do something to his poor teeth, with the excuse that he needed to practice.

However, with playing the piano came with baggage.

It wouldn't have been so bad if Wes had suggested that they try playing together one day. Or if his parents hadn't watched, and became confused when Soul took a different approach to the piece than Wes. It especially wouldn't have been so bad if he could have kept up with his brother. Wes was a good guy, he tried to encourage his brother, tried slowing down the tempo, tried meeting Soul's octaves.

The evidence that they were different had become very clear. Ever since that day Soul had tried to stray away from the instrument, but considering it was the only thing his parents were interested in him mastering, the idea of leaving it became almost like a dream. His parents wanted him to meet Wes' level, to be like his older brother playing soft ballads and melodies, to get over the ruckus some people supposedly called jazz music.

It only made the boy more self conscious, made him slink further and further away from the keys and his family, made him angry at them. Angry for not accepting such an important part of him, for not giving him space, for strangling and suffocating him in that big damn house filled with all those maids and people trying to fix him.

For not telling any one of them, or anybody who made a disgusted comment at one of their huge and crowded parties about his music, that he didn't need fixing.

They weren't abusive, and they weren't horrible. He wished they were his aunt and uncle rather than his parents though. They just weren't very good parents. At least, not for him. His older brother was a different story. Wes could handle himself, and he was so sure of himself. People liked him. He didn't need their parents if that's what the worse came down to. He had friends to back him up, gotten quite a load of money to his name from the house's funds, he was set. All Wes needed was his music, and he would be fine.

Soul was different. Many of the kids in his huge and fancy school didn't talk to him. Red eyes may have been cool on Wes, but with the combinations of Soul's teeth, many kids stared at him like he was a shark trying to find his prey's weak spot.

He was alone, a stranger in his own home.

When he discovered he possessed the weapon blood in his veins, he couldn't help but be shocked. And curious. And shocked again.

One thing that Wes didn't have, Soul finally did. He got the upper hand. Soul didn't even care that the kids at school might stare or be more afraid of him. He didn't care that his parents had decided to send him away because of it. He liked his newfound ability, because it was a small victory in the war waged on his self esteem after all those years. It was all completely him.

His brother was interested in it, wanted Soul to stick around longer so they could talk and things, but as soon the semester started at the new academy was going to, he was off.

Though his relationship and connections with his brother and their parents didn't have such a strong standing at all after he left, he started to feel better.

Death City was smaller than his hometown to be completely honest. Many of the kids living there were like him, or they were meisters. He didn't feel like such a freak with his red eyes and sharp teeth after seeing countless girls walk around with pink hair, and a couple of guys too.

It didn't take too long for him to meet the girl that would change his life.

Maka Albarn was her name. Green eyes, not too tall but was mostly lean legs anyways so it wasn't like it mattered too much, and she was ... Well, tiny.

She gave out a squeak the first time he hugged her, causing him to pull away quickly afraid that he might have crushed her, but instead he ended up laughing at her bright red cheeks and how her eyes were trained on their feet.

He ended up making more friends as his studies continued, though he did take his time before officially befriending them. Soul made a point to test the waters a little, develop opinions before becoming too attached. First it was the blue haired boy named Black*Star and his partner, then a couple of fellow classmates, and then a while later it was the young reaper with his twin pistols.

The only person he didn't take his time befriending was his partner.

He ended up living with Maka to help her cover her apartment costs, though he never fully explained to her where the money was coming from the first few months. She didn't prod too much into the subject though, and he was grateful. Soul was a bit worried first, because it was clear that she was different from him. She didn't like video games too much, she read many books which weren't his fine suit, and they argued often over which radio station to play during chores.

And she was also there for him.

He didn't know why he had opened up to her and became so attached to her at first, but as time went on and they grew up - going on missions where they nearly lost each other, almost losing the world to madness - he knew exactly why. She wasn't like his family.

Even their closest friends accidentally ended up sharing a similar trait to his folks. They all held onto an idea of him, an expectation of sorts. He was probably the most loyal friend you could ask for after all.

They all expected him to do whatever Soul did, counted on him for it. The black blood. The piano. The clam head during battle. It was pressure, to always live up to being the Death Scythe, expected to be the best. Much like how his parents expected him to become the best piano player.

Of course the given situations were different. Soul would always step up to the challenge if it meant keeping his meister and his friends safe in battle. They had become a new type of family to him, one that he let himself become close to. He liked being Maka's weapon, and he liked the perks that being a Death Scythe came with on the scale of coolness. It was just the pressure to keep everyone he loved and cared about safe nagged a bit on the pressure he felt from his parents in his musical endeavors, and he couldn't help but make the slim connection. Even if it was slim, it killed him a little to admit to it.

Maka however was like him. Not their friends. Though he had spoken to Black*Star and Kid about what it felt like to be meisters, they never voiced their opinions on what it felt like in battle. The pressure to keep each other safe. They just explained how it felt to wield a weapon, the connection, the rush, the wavelengths, all that stuff.

His meister was different though. The two had spent a night in, just causally laying around, messing with each other's hair, when he asked her about it. She hesitated at first, having similar conversations other times and them turning sorrow, but she explained a few moments later about the drive she felt to keep him safe. The conflict. How she greatly took his advice and comments into account, because she wanted to make sure they both walked away unharmed. That all those time he was in danger she felt like she had failed her job, how it killed her a little each time she saw red somewhere on him that wasn't his eyes.

She was like him. She felt the pressure too, and he knew it all along.

To be the best meister the academy had ever seen. To out do her mother's work. Though she took it in stride, Soul wondered if he wasn't by her side to back her up, to help ease some of the weight off her shoulders, if she still would.

She had listened to him ramble about his family, their expectations, so many other things that bugged him countless nights after he came down from a scream inducing nightmare. Maka had heard of his family's talent. She had listened to his piano, and heard a CD of Wes' violin.

Yet Maka still never made connections, comparisons, nothing. She challenged him on a few things, but that was on him alone. She accepted his worries, his fears, told him her own, and she still cared about him. She hugged him, gave him warmth, was always there to back him up.

When he locked himself away in his room grumbling about something after a long day, she gave him his space, let him talk it out over a large dinner without interrupting him, only stopping him to ask questions.

The apartment they lived in was smaller than his old house by hundreds of square feet, maybe even a thousand or so, but it was just the two of them there. It was warm, and relaxing. Cozy, but even with their friends over, it was never crowded. The biggest difference between it and his old residence though, was that he really did consider it home, because home was wherever she was at.

He didn't need a lot to feel at home. He didn't need a lot from Maka to end up falling in love with her. Turns out, she didn't need much from him in return either, because as soon as he had gained her trust and her loyalty, he had also gained her love.

He thinks about this all as he thrusts into her. As he peppers her neck with kisses before pressing his lips up to her. As she finishes, clenching around causing his release. He stays connected to her a little longer than he probably should, his thoughts collecting again as he comes down. Soul likes being this close to her, likes holding her, likes this connection he has with her, and only her. Something no one else has with her either.

They're there for each other, partners until the end, and in love with each other even after. She's all he needs. No fancy house, car, dinnerware. No big city life. None of that. He already has a family here in Death City. One he's grown to count on and care about no matter what. One that, annoys him sure, but cares about him just as much in return.

He even ends up becoming an uncle to more than just Wes' children. It's not the most amazing feeling having Tsubaki pry her daughter's hands off of Soul's hair, or listening to Black*Star scold at their son for ripping the sleeve of of Soul's shirt. It's not the most fun experience having to help Kid plan his twins' birthday party when Liz is too morning sickened with their third to help. Or having to help Kid calm down a class of Kindergartens after Patti stole all the crayons for her own personal art project.

He wouldn't trade it for the world though, because the looks on his honorary nieces' and nephews' faces when they come back from missions with something as simple as a snow globe or a keychain for them is priceless. It's beyond cute when the kids try to spar each other after watching their parents do the same. And when two of them find out they're weapons, just like their mothers, it makes Soul beam to watch them bounce up and down, already picturing them in his or Maka's classroom wrecking havoc.

When it becomes his turn to have these experiences as a dad himself, he couldn't be more proud of his daughter. He couldn't love her or her mother more than the world, because she Maka is his world. Compared to Wes' life, or the life he may have had if he had never been a weapon, it's very little. In this case though, Soul's content with little. His small wife, and his little girl. He's more than content.

Because to him, less is more.


End file.
